CHAOS
by I-survived-life
Summary: Someone was messing with her kingdom and spreading rumors about her. She didn't know who it was but whoever they were, she didn't like them, they were upsetting the balance of the school and no one messed with the Gossip Queen.


Rumors can make or break a person. They can either gain you respect and fame or result in the lowering of your social status. It all depends, really, on what the rumor it is and whom it's also depends on how people view the rumor going around, they can either view you as a hero or they can whisper behind your back and tell stories of how you're vicious and mean; it all depends on the public.

Sophie O'Grady knew exactly how to use the fact that people were extremely nosy and couldn't mind their own business to her advantage. It was how she maintained power in the school and how she was so powerful. No one could trace the rumors back to her and even if they could, what were they going to do about it? She was the Gossip Queen, the Rumor Empress; she could build you up and destroy you with a few words that she "accidentally" let slip while someone was nearby.

Sophie had a kingdom, she controlled everything, while the teacher's saw her as an exceptionally bright student that was too lazy to do any work, the students of Hogwarts saw her as their ruler.

The majority of them anyway.

Forget the children of the Golden Trio; Sophie O'Grady was the one at the top, the one who had the most influence. No one messed with her, everyone stayed out of her way and she stayed out of theirs. Those that dared defy her and say anything nasty about her found themselves shunned by the majority of Hogwarts and looked down on.

What Sophie O'Grady said was law, discussion closed, end of story. You didn't question what she said and you didn't go against it, you just nodded your head in agreement, that's how it worked.

Sophie O'Grady was a tyrant.

She was mean and she knew it. Some people disliked her and she knew it. No one could do anything to stop her or strip her of her crown and she made sure that everyone knew it.

Life was good for Sophie, she had great marks, no friends, everyone was scared but at the same time in awe of her and she was single. What more could a girl want? She was extremely conceited and arrogant and never once did it ever cross her mind that there was someone out there who was going to take away her kingdom and that she would be just like everyone else.

When she woke up that bright fall morning and got washed and dressed for another day of classes, the very last thing that she expected was to see James Potter looking at her. The very last thing that she expected was for someone to decide that they'd had enough and that they were taking her down. If she'd known that was going to happen, Sophie would've just laughed it off.

She skipped off down to breakfast and seated herself at the Slytherin table. Everyone nearby immediately moved away from her and averted their eyes. Sophie smiled to herself and drank her cup of orange juice; yeah, everything in her life was good.

Once she'd finished breakfast, she pushed away her plate and looked through her school bag to make sure that she had everything. She may have been a lazy student but she still wanted to be prepared and ready for class. When she looked up again, her eyes immediately landed on James Potter, a boy who was staring at her with a smirk on his face.

In response, Sophie simply raised one blonde eyebrow and got out of her seat. Who cared about James Potter, he was just another Potter who had lost his throne to the blonde and very cunning Sophie O'Grady. She strutted out of the Great Hall and smiled as everyone scrambled to get out of her way.

She would never get tired of this.

Sophie strutted down the hall confidently, her straight blonde hair swung behind her, her head was held high and it didn't matter where she stepped or if she looked to make sure that she wasn't going to step on anything or anyone, the way would always be clear.

The girls threw her envious glances but they immediately averted their gaze when Sophie turned to look at them. She lived off of everyone else's jealousy. They really had no reason to be jealous though, anyone could've been in Sophie's place but everyone else hadn't learned how to use Hogwarts to their own advantage. There was a reason that Sophie was a Slytherin.

She walked into the Transfiguration classroom and was about to make her way over to her usual seat only to be met with the unwelcome sight of someone already sitting in it. The feeling of rage was beginning to take over her and without even realizing it; Sophie had begun grinding her teeth. Everyone looked between the messy-haired boy sitting in her seat and Sophie; they were expecting her to explode any minute.

How dare he? How dare this boy take her seat? Didn't he know who she was? Didn't he know that she could destroy him within five minutes?

Sophie marched over to the person currently sitting at her table and balancing on the back legs of one of the chairs. No one ever sat with Sophie unless she gave them the okay. That was how it worked; if the Queen didn't want you to sit with her then you didn't sit with her.

The clacking of Sophie's shoes could be heard over all of the mutterings of her classmates. Everyone stopped what they were doing and watched as Sophie made her way over to the intruder. She stood in front of the desk with her arms crossed, her hip cocked and a cool expression on her face. She may have wanted nothing more than to hit this intruder in the face but no one else needed to see that.

As far as they were concerned the Queen had no feelings and no weaknesses, any insult that you came up with would bounce off of her armor.

A look of shock flitted across Sophie's face when she saw that it was James Potter who was sitting in her seat. The look was so brief that those around her couldn't even be sure that it had actually been there. James had seen it though, instead of smirking however, he simply settled for an amused look. This infuriated Sophie even more.

People usually cowered under the look that she was giving James and immediately left but he was just sitting there, looking at her as if she was the funniest and most ridiculous thing that he had ever seen. No one looked at her like that; no one had any reason to look at her like that.

"Yes?" James asked smiling up at her as if nothing was wrong.

"You're in my seat," Sophie answered through gritted teeth. Her jaw was going to be hurting like hell if she kept grinding her teeth like that.

"Oh, really?" James asked in mock surprise. It took all of her self-restraint to stop from stomping her foot like a spoiled child and demanding that he get out of her spot.

"Yes, really."

"I don't see a name anywhere," James replied, looking under the table and behind the chairs to make sure that there wasn't one.

"That's because I haven't written it anywhere, this is still my seat, this is where I sit every time," Sophie said, some of her annoyance coming out. She looked James over from head to toe and scrunched up her nose to show her distaste. He was the sloppiest person that she had ever seen. His shirt was untucked and clearly in need of a wash if the yellow stain near the collar was anything to go by; his tie was hanging around his neck loosely and his belt seemed to be tightened quite a bit which obviously meant that James was wearing a pair of pants one size too big. James' robes were falling off of his shoulders and his school bag was so tattered and old Sophie was surprised it hadn't fallen apart.

No doubt it would have ink stains on it from the ink bottle that had probably been opened in the bag. James just looked like the type of person who that would've happened to.

"So then sit," replied James, shrugging and pointed to the seat next to him. Sophie pursed her lips so much that they practically disappeared and frowned. She had to admit, James did have a good point, there were two seats at the table and technically, he had taken the chair next to the one that she usually sat in; he wasn't really sitting in her seat. She'd just sat at the table by herself most of the time that now she had come to think of all of it as her seat.

"Maybe you didn't hear me, this is _my _seat," Sophie said, putting her hands on flat on the table and leaning towards James.

"And this is a free country," James replied coolly.

"Do you have any idea who I am? Do you know who you're messing with?" Sophie hissed quietly.

"Sophie O'Grady," James answered. Neither of them moved for about half a minute but Sophie finally gave in. Obviously James wasn't going to back down anytime soon and she really had much better things to do than stand there and have a staring match. If James wanted his reputation destroyed, then fine, Sophie would be more than happy to oblige.

With a frustrated sigh, Sophie kicked back the old wooden chair next to James and dumped her bag on the floor next to her. She took out her Transfiguration textbook, her quill and one sheet of parchment along with an almost empty bottle of ink and set it on the table. Everything was organized, as usual. The textbook was sitting closed in front of her with a blank sheet of parchment and a quill lying next to it and her ink bottle on her right corner. Once that was done, Sophie sat back in her chair and with a huff, crossed her arms and legs, turned away from James and stuck her nose in the air.

It was quiet for about five seconds and then the sound of someone choking started coming from next to Sophie. Sophie came out of her childish position long enough to see that James was trying to keep himself from laughing.

"I'm sorry," he said as he tried to control the chuckles that were escaping him, "it's just that you look so ridiculously childish that I couldn't help myself."

Sophie frowned and turned her body towards James, her arms still crossed. "What do you mean?" she asked.

"Well, you're described as this all powerful Ice Queen and you give off the impression that you're mature and smart but you're really just a spoiled, petty and childish person," James said. Sophie's jaw dropped open in shock. Who was James Sirius Potter to tell her that she was acting like a five-year-old!? Who did this nobody think he was, walking around and telling her that she was petty?!

James didn't seem at all worried about the fact that he had insulted the most powerful person in the entire school. He was doodling on his parchment short figures making silly faces up at the ceiling.

"Well you're –you're," Sophie struggled to come up with something to throw back at James but she was at a loss. She knew nothing about this boy, she never paid attention to him and she was so far into her own world that half of the time she didn't even know he existed. What kind of insult could she possibly throw back besides "well, you're ugly," without sounding lame.

"Let me know when you think up a comeback," James replied and turned his attention back to his doodling. Sophie sat where she was without saying anything. She glanced over at James repeatedly and started thinking about how he'd showed up to class before her. She'd finished breakfast before him, how on earth did he get to Transfiguration before her.

She'd been staring at him for so long that she hadn't even realized she'd begun staring, but James had.

"Go on, ask me," James said as he chewed on the end of his quill. Sophie couldn't stop the look of disgust from coming on her face. That quill was on a bird, it had been on the bird and that bird had no doubt been dirty, how could he put something like that in his mouth?

Even if it had been cleaned since it was taken from the bird, it was probably dirtier now than it had been when it was on the bird because it was stuck around James Potter all of the time.

"Ask you what?" she asked eyeing him suspiciously.

"Ask me how I got here before you did, I know you want to know, you've been staring at me for the past minute frowning," James said turning his head to the side so that he could make eye contact and grinning at her.

"That's not what I was wondering," Sophie lied, "you're flattering yourself if you think that I care about something so small."

"But you were wondering, see, you don't like not knowing things, you like to know everything that's going on, isn't that right?" James asked her with a knowing look. He was referring to something much bigger than the map. Sophie responded with total silence and it was a good thing that the conversation had ended because the lesson had started.

All throughout the lesson Sophie kept glancing at James in the hope that she might understand him better by just looking at him. She wanted to figure out how he worked, how to get under his skin, how to make him angry. The problem was, James seemed like the only laidback and easygoing person and he didn't look like someone who could be angered easily.

She didn't know whether James knew that she was staring but if he did, Sophie couldn't tell. That was another disadvantage, James was a good actor.

When the bell rang and signaled the end of class, Sophie closed her Transfiguration textbook with a snap, folded up her parchment containing her notes, and put them away in her bag. She'd grabbed her quill and was putting the stopper on her ink bottle while making her way towards the classroom door. She didn't want to spend another minute near James Potter.

She stopped in the doorway of the classroom and with her tongue between her teeth, focused on the ink stopper that just wasn't cooperating. It seemed that no matter what she did the thing wouldn't fit on top of the ink bottle.

A pair of giggling girls passing by Sophie caught her attention; she looked up and studied them closely as they walked past her, trying to hide their laughter behind their hands. She frowned but didn't think anything of it until she heard one of the girls whisper loudly, "Did you hear, apparently Sophie O'Grady snogged a third year."

Her mouth dropped open and Sophie stared after the girls, who had scurried away, in shock. That shock was quickly replaced by anger as she heard a boyish chuckle come from behind her. She turned around and glared at James as he walked away. He was having difficulty disguising his laughter as a cough but by the time that he'd reached the end of the corridor, he had completely given up on trying to hide the fact that he was highly amused.

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**A/N:** so this story popped into my head and after having some difficult in starting the chapter, I've finally managed to get this first chapter written out. I haven't written something like this before so any suggestions and feedback that you have is highly appreciated!

**Disclaimer: **Rumor Has It is the property of Adele, not me. And thank you to cynical tda for the amazing cover!


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